Belarusian professional boxer Sergey Khomitsky, 39, wins the
super-middleweight WBO European champion title, defeating former
champion, Frank Buglioni of the UK.The fight was held at London’s Cooper Box Arena. 24 year old Frank — who was defending his WBO super-middleweight belt for the third time, was the easy favourite, but his 13th fight turned out to be an unlucky one for him. This defeat to Khomitsky is Buglioni’s first professional loss in his career, having won 12 times, including 9 knock-outs.
From the very first minute of the fight, the Belarusian was the stronger fighter, pressing his opponent hard after a series of accurate blows, Sergey continued boxing well throughout. In the sixth round, after the Belarusian badly wobbled the defending champion, the referee was forced to stop the contest. Khomitsky won by technical knock-out, bringing the tough Belarusian the WBO European title.
Sergey, who is trained by the famous Belarusian specialist, Konstantin Makhankov, at the Belarusian State University of Physical Culture and Sports’ boxing gym, has had 42 fights in his career. Before meeting Frank, he had won 28 times in the professional arena — including 11 knock-outs, with 10 losses and two draws.
Our Belarusian boxers have celebrated several major victories recently. A national team member, Pavel Kostromin, recently won bronze in the 69kg category at the 31st Amateur Felix Stamm Memorial (dedicated to the Polish boxing school’s founder) — in Warsaw, which saw male and female athletes gather from 22 different countries.
The Belarusian defeated Irishman, Stephen Donnelly in the quarter-finals — 3:0, to reach the semis and guarantee himself a medal. Sadly, Pavel was unable to fight further as damage from the previous round prevented him from facing the Georgian, Zaal Kvachatadze. Other Belarusian sportsmen won no medals in Warsaw: Vazgen Safaryants (64kg) lost to Russian boxer, Vitaly Dunaitsev in the 1/8 finals — 1:2, while Andrey Mikhailov (75kg) was defeated by the Ukrainian, Alexey Kasamzade in the quarter-finals — 0:3.
